THE Lusaka High Court has reserved ruling on whether the Patriotic Front should be joined to the matter in which estranged Matero Member of Parliament Miles Sampa is challenging the declaration of his seat as vacant.

The case was adjourned to February 16 by High Court Judge Betty Mung’omba when the matter came up for inter-parte hearing yesterday.

Earlier this week, Patriotic Front (PF) secretary general Davies Chama applied to the High Court to be joined to the matter in which Mr Sampa is contesting the declaration of his Matero seat vacant by Speaker of the National Assembly Patrick Matibini.

Mr Chama argued that PF had an interest in Mr Sampa’s action because it sponsored him and won the seat as MP for Matero constituency.

This was after Mr Sampa was granted leave to commence judicial review to challenge the Speaker’s decision to declare his seat vacant.

Mr Chama submitted that Mr Sampa’s resignation from the PF to form a new party prompted the Speaker to declare the Matero seat vacant.

He further indicated that he was informed by his advocates that anyone with an interest in judicial review proceedings could join the action to defend their rights.

Mr Chama argued that it could only be fair that PF was allowed in order to defend its rights.

In this case, Mr Sampa stated in his affidavit that he was the Matero member of Parliament.

He sued the Attorney General and the Electoral Commission of Zambia (ECZ) over the purported declaration of his seat vacant.

Mr Sampa explained that on January 26, the Attorney General served him with a letter issued by the Clerk of the National Assembly informing him that the seat he held on the PF ticket was now vacant.

He also submitted that the decision of the Speaker to declare his Matero seat vacant was tainted with irregularities.

Mr Sampa also applied for a stay of the decision of the Speaker, adding that if the order of stay was not granted, he shall be highly prejudiced as a current serving member of the Patriotic Front political party and shall consequently suffer irreparable damage as the hearing of the judicial review would merely be an academic exercise.